Book Review: “Cosmic Trends: Astrology Connects the Dots,” by Phillip Brown

Written in the Stars 

Cosmic Trends by Phil Brown is a fascinating read. This new publication from Llewellyn Press is written in a clear, easy-to-understand style and format that will appeal to the astrology novice, yet the book is so chock-full of information that the astrology professional will want to add it to his or her bookshelf for reference and review of important concepts.

Cosmic Trends explicates in detail the historical phenomena associated with the movements of the outer planets. It contains plenty of background material, so we can see how the movements of Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto have affected historical trends in politics, art and culture going back through the centuries of recorded Western Civilization. 

In the fashion of Janus, the Roman spirit of doorways and transitions, author Phillip Brown also turns his gaze forward to the future to offer many original forecasts for the decades to come.

Brown juxtaposes examples from popular culture, movies, the internet, news and entertainment trends from the mass media, scientific inventions and mass marketing techniques and styles with examples from high culture: literary quotes from classic novels and trends in art and literary history that define Western cultural history.

For example, we learn that Neptune was in Scorpio when the Beatles came along and that even their name reflects the glamorization of Scorpionic energy.  We learn that Pluto in Sagittarius brought us big, from supersized fast-food to mini-mansions for houses — and we learn that Pluto moving into Capricorn will bring us more governmental and social control, along with a Las Vegas style, Dionysian carnival atmosphere that will appeal to the elder folk, something like the stage environment of Shakespeare’s play, Twelfth Night, a play that brings us into a madcap world of mistaken identities, cross-dressing and masks.

Brown, who holds a masters degree in English literature and is an English teacher, displays an excellent command of literature, astrology, and popular culture, which he weaves deftly into an extraordinarily smooth teaching text so that we are entertained as much as we are absorbed in the learning of the planetary principles. 

His use of metaphor is extraordinary; for example, Neptune and Pluto are illustrated by the notion of the broken mirror that cannot be put back together again, and Neptune and Uranus become the graphic design of 1960’s paisley, representing the Utopian bent of the present-day computerized art movement and the egalitarian energy of the Internet – much like the Transcendental movement in American literature during the 19th Century.

 Creative Device

Brown uses the teaching device of bubble charts, which are used as a way of generating associative ideas, a way of brainstorming connections.  He shows the technique, gives a list of questions to generate thought and provides a blank bubble chart for the reader to begin his or her own process of discovery.

After reading Cosmic Trends, you will realize you have learned at lot about popular culture, as well as a great deal about literature, art, the history of science, and of course — astrology.  You will come away with new insights into the long-range evolutionary cycles of history, and you will find yourself looking at the world around you in a new way: through the lense of astrological interpretation.

This book will be especially important for astrologers practicing the Mundane or Political specialties of astrology, yet it will also be of great value to the novice, as well as to the astrologer who is primarily interested in the more personal areas of astrology, such as personality description or general delineation to answer a variety of questions.

Since this book is so easy to understand, I would recommend it particularly to the non-astrologer as an introduction to the creative art of astrological interpretation.

Phil Brown has made it easy to see through the lens of astrological paradigms, so that we come away with new understanding not only of our cultural past, but also of our potential future, which promises to be rich with the excitement of new inventions and the advent of cultural and political transformations.

–Urania (Robin Jenkins)